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About

Michel M. Maharbiz is a pioneering researcher at the intersection of bioengineering, microsystems, and neural interfaces. His work spans three transformative areas: stretchable electronics, biological microactuators, and minimally invasive neural recording technologies. Maharbiz’s most cited work, a 2012 paper on a highly elastic capacitive strain gauge using percolating carbon nanotube networks (495 citations), introduced a rapid fabrication method that enabled unprecedented stretchability in wearable sensors. He also demonstrated closed-loop control of insect leg motion via electrical muscle stimulation (2014, 65 citations), creating a biological microactuator with three degrees of freedom—a landmark in biohybrid robotics. More recently, his “sewing machine” approach to neural recording (2019, 65 citations) proposed a scalable, minimally invasive system for implanting flexible electrode arrays into the brain, addressing a critical bottleneck in high-resolution neural interfaces. Beyond the lab, Maharbiz is committed to engineering education, having developed a tinkering-driven robot hack curriculum that boosts student self-efficacy in circuit prototyping. With over 500 citations on his flagship work alone, Maharbiz continues to shape the future of bio-integrated electronics and neural engineering.